discussion on the privacy of e-mails and other electronic communications. "washington journal" is next. are looking live at the u.s. host: the senate has narrowly passed its first budget in 40 years as democrats went on record favoring almost $1 trillion in tax increases. little talk about that a later on in the program. for the first 45 minutes of this edition of the washington journal, we are going to be talking about the affordable care act. thirdebrates its anniversary today. it is known as obamacare.

we want to find out your thoughts about the affordable care act three years and. here are the numbers, if you want to give us a call -- reach out to also us by social media. you can follow us on twitter, we you canacebook, and send us an e-mail. the address is journal@c- span.org. thatis one of the items came from yesterday's express, the washington post express. the headline --

want to show you and let you listen in to what the president had to say the signing of the affordable care act three years ago, and then we will get to your calls. [video clip] >> it was your work, your commitment come a your unyielding hope that made the surgery possible.

when special interests deployed an army of lobbyists, negative ads to preserve the status quo, you did not give up. you hit the phones and you took to the streets. you mobilized and organized. you turned of the pressure and kept up the fight. who there was upset over was up and who was down, you never lost sight of what was right and what was wrong. the: we're talking about third anniversary anniversary of the affordable care act. our first call from ohio, democrats. good morning. caller: good morning, i am happy to see you. the reason for my call is very simple. i have children and grandchildren who work full-time jobs without benefit of health care. i am one the millions of americans that is so appreciative of the affordable health care act. they each have medical issues,

so that makes them uninsurable. i am very happy to have the affordable health care act. host: can you talk to me about something specific in your life or the lives of your children that he had been able to do a result of the affordable care act? --l caller: my children have not signed up yet, but my son has issues with kidney stones. my daughter, who also works full-time, has a pretty cancerous uterus birth -- a precancerous uterus. they will sign up because they all need medical attention. without health, because when you get an officer to visit, they ask you your name, then they ask you the name of your insurance. if you don't have insurance, they won't take you. the american people need affordable health care act,

just like they need social security and medicare. host: we will move on to north carolina, our republican line. caller: good morning. i have been hearing so much of the fact that doctors are beginning to not be available. there are many doctors now that will not take you as a patient if you are on medicare. ,hey have cut the payments back that they cannot afford to. medicaid would be even worse than that. the fact that so much money has intomoved from medicare this affordable care act, which is not affordable, means a lot of people are going to have so- called insurance, but will not be able to get a doctor. when you thing is, get to a point where everybody has to have insurance, you will find that everybody can't get

it. a lot of people are going to pay a fine, a lot will pay extra for health care. insurance is going skyhigh. it was forced on everybody. it is not popular. nobody wants it. except for that persona does not know anything about what she is getting. the: florida, you are on washington journal, independent line. caller: good morning, thank you for having me on. host: your thoughts. caller: well, it is clear that ratedresident has medicare to make more promises that he cannot follow through on, they make promises that they cannot keep.

we have to be able to afford them. and thatis promised should be kept. ,ost: from the huffington post ted cruz amendment to repair -- repeal obamacare failed. host: we want to show you a little bit about what senator using theo say about

anniversary of the affordable care act to discuss an amendment to repeal it. [video clip] >> obamacare is hurting hispanics, african-americans, single moms and the economy. it should be repealed. yesterday, 70 members voted to remove the tax on medical device providers. i happily voted for that, and i would point out that it is a wealthy industry that can afford to hire lobbyists. we should not be are sponsored not just a corporate lobbyists, but to the people, the small businesses that are being hurt by obamacare, to the workers that are being hurt. we should be responsive to the american people, and for that reason, to repealve fund obamacare. host: the senator speaking on

the floor of the senate yesterday regarding an mm it to repeal -- an amendment to repeal the affordable care act. steve is calling us from indianapolis, democrat line. good morning. , there is so much waste in healthcare today. with the affordable health care act, i think that is one thing that is targeting is waste. one of my family's biggest expenses healthcare, and that is with insurance through my employer. thatis my biggest expense we have in our budget, so i think if they can target ways are you have lobbyists that lobbying hard for insurance companies, that ought to be an indication to all of us that this health care act is something we all need. host: michael in florida, on our

line for republicans. caller: thanks for taking my call. host: your thoughts about the verbal care act. caller: i think it should be repealed. i think it is a disaster. the president lied about the cost of it. the people that are going to receive it don't care or know how it is going to be funded. i just think it is a total disaster, and they're going to destroy the best healthcare system in the industry. host: is there anything specifically in the affordable care act that afford -- affects you personally? caller: it already has been affecting me. my health care costs have been going up. the president said prices were not going to go up, it has been a total farce. host: your healthcare costs have gone up? caller: correct, 30%. host: william in louisiana, independent line. go ahead. william, are you there?

caller: yes. host: go ahead, please. is that itconcern is so bad that he has to put his own name on it. i mean, come on. if he is truly concerned about us, the market people, why is he spending millions of dollars -- sin -- spending millions of dollars to fly to hawaii for christmas? wake up, america. does this have to do with the affordable care act? how can we make anything affordable when he spends millions of dollars on one airplane trip? host: some conversation that is taking place on facebook, facebook.com/c-span.

host: the conversation continues on facebook.com/c-span. is on ourennessee line for democrats. why don't you remind these people when they call in that it hasn't even been enacted yet?

ted, come on. all these people that are selfish and worried about money, god did not create money. -- god helpidea you, america. int: next up is ray massachusetts. go ahead, ray. caller: hello? if you guys get over the racism, it is the law. get over it. the people who killed the people interact, it is the law. -- in iraq. host: what is the affordable care act have to do with racism ? caller: it has a lot to do with racism, taking her -- taking

care of people -- we should cut the healthcare for the congress. see how they like it. we will move onto clay in biloxi, mississippi. caller: good morning. disabilityd and on after working 14 years, the five years of court reporting. we had a bombardment of advertisements for simple move -- healthcare for medicare. we find it replaces the medicare policy we currently have. after the deadline passed for the supplements, humana stopped advertising in mississippi. you can't get in touch with humana. the bureaucracy is just going to increase and as leaving the poor tople at a disadvantage

correct and try to make reasonable choices for their healthcare. thank you for taking my call. host: a statement put out yesterday by the office of house democratic -- released following the statement today in recognition of the third anniversary of the affordable care act. becausethe statement, of the affordable care act --

, our back to the phones democrat line. ronald in detroit, michigan. caller: hello, good morning. host: your thoughts on the third anniversary of the affordable care act. caller: i can't believe for the life of me that some of these people that are calling in our core than snake oil, but they want to object to medical healthcare for all of our american citizens. everywhere in the world where the government is looking out for them people, they have health care coverage for it insurance companies know when they go to the system, they are out of business. i will be glad when we go to a so allpayer system americans will be covered without having to spend their entire welfare covering medical bills. i can't believe americans are so stupid. host: eleanor on our line for dependents.

-- independents. caller: it seems like the republicans want to stand up for big business. at least now when the affordable care act, the insurance companies have to pay a larger portion towards patient care, i think that is the report that problem republican have with it. , our line for democrats. are you there? caller: yes. i don't think that what they are doing to obama after they put , inin the chair that we florida, as older people, as you call it, done it worked and paid into it, we need the health thing. i have been on its in putting sinced i have seen --

1988. i have seen it three or four times change. why do they put any president in and they keep changing it? now, they put obama in their -- there. ,ou say it is not a racial call but it looks everything base -- that he says, they knock him down area an. we old people deserve to have -- proper medical care. you have other colors. host: this is a statement by

the chairman of the policy committee -- host: back to the phones, rick in massachusetts is on our line for independents. go ahead. caller: good morning, everyone. i am in the upper middle income bracket and i support the health care law. until we get to the point where hospitals refuse people with no insurance, we have to make sure that people that can pay for it , pay for it.

am a bit disgusted that the largest group against it are that are on medicare. as people know, that is the program that has to be reformed. that is going to cause the country to go broke in the future. if people can look it is rationally, this is what we have to do. thank you. host: we are continuing the conversation on twitter. we have this tweet who writes -- ont: betty in alabama is our line for democrats. go ahead, you are on the washington journal. caller: good morning. i'm sorry, my husband works at a

company that had good insurance back in 2000. in 2001, they went out of business. our insurance was blue cross blue shield. it skyrocketed to $700 a month. who can pay $700 a month? my husband is -- unemployed and on disability. he has insurance because he was a veteran. myself, i don't have it. host: betty in alabama. thanks for your call. on the cover of the recent edition of the national review, wemacare chronic condition, will take a look inside in just a few seconds. first, this call from brian in massachusetts. republican line. caller: i would like to point

notthat obamacare has hired a single doctor or single nurse for all the expense. that a loan should make us think about repealing. thank you. , on: this is the article the inside of the national review --

is on our line for independents calling from richmond, virginia. go ahead. caller: good morning. has everything to do about being affordable. as a divorced man who pays child support, just add another expense to people like me that work hard to make their money that forced me to go pay for insurance. that is all it is. i am being forced to do something. just one more thing i have to do. host: how much has the cost of your insurance gone up? caller: i don't have insurance right now. host: you said you are forced to pay for it? caller: the only thing that takes 1500 pages to make you do something. another 800 pages to do something else.

to do with this big bill. host: sorry about that. i thought you are finished. the coverage coming up on c-span networks, next tuesday and wednesday, the supreme court hears oral arguments and the california same-sex marriage ban, and the federal defense of marriage act. the same-sex marriage act is on tuesday. c-span television and radio coverage begins tuesday at one in the afternoon and c-span.org, as soon as the audio is released among this argument will re-air on c-span at 8 p.m. eastern time. on wednesday, c-span tv and radio coverage begins at 2 p.m., and on c-span or, as soon as the audio is released and the argument re-airs on c-span, it will be at 8 p.m.

if you want to find out more details about our coverage about what is happening in the supreme court next tuesday and wednesday, go to our website, c- span.org. we will continue our conversation regarding the third anniversary of the affordable care act with jeff in brooklyn, michigan. our democrat line. caller: i think the biggest problem with obamacare, enough people don't know what is going on with that yet. because i have epilepsy and it has been hard for me me to get insurance so far. the more people realize the benefits of it, the more positive it will get. host: what is it about it right now that you don't understand or would like to see more information about? -- don't lot of people know a month -- enough about the individual mandate and how it

affects people's lives. i just think it is father -- farther along, people will realize how beneficial it is to them. host: we have another tweet, this one writes -- john in north dakota, our line for republicans. go ahead. caller: good morning. .y name is john lewis [indiscernible] i love it. , i lefteft my job everything. so when i come back to north dakota, i have a new job.

[indiscernible] then you have nothing -- the second thought is, people in i am only 26 years old. the last time i voted, i voted democrat. [indiscernible] this is not obamacare. this is health care for all people in america. this is the problem i have with democrats. it is not obamacare, it is for everyone. host: some other items in the news this morning, the lead story in the "washington post" talks about president obama's trip to the middle east --

host: this is also how the story was covered in the new york times this morning -- in ourack to the phones discussion regarding the third anniversary of the affordable care act. james is on the line for

independents. he lives in lafayette, indiana. go ahead. caller: i don't understand how any doctor can refuse you service because there's not a person in this country who has not used the american taxpayer dollars to get their education. a friend of mine was refused service. somebody will have to explain that to me. i don't understand it. thank you. host: we have got more on the affordable care act. this is some analysis from the urban institute, and they write --

third, the new law will not affect most firms --

new york is on our line for democrats. good morning. caller: hi. yeah, i am calling listening to everybody who has called. it is really very upsetting, this entire thing. people in this country need help. everybody knows it, and the reason i am calling is president obama at some point has said that what we ought to do is give doctors the money, extra healthfor preventive care. you go into a doctor's office nowadays, and the first thing he does is give you a pill. a lot of people, they will give you samples. a lot of of people don't know, but these doctors get money for pressuring certain pills. and i think that is absolutely

wrong. evidently, it is not illegal. i think somebody ought to look into that, because it would bring down the cost of everything. it would make people a lot healthier, because you would get and in ar, possibly better way. it would just keep a lot of these banks out of the ointment -- snakes. mitch mcconnell put out a statement on the three-year anniversary of obamacare -- host: we want to show you more

of what the senator had to say. this is a statement they put out on youtube. [video clip] the excessesms up like obamacare. .0,000 pages, seven feet tall they are just getting started. everything they promised about obamacare is not coming true. premiums are going up, not downgrade the president said said people would not lose their policies. they are. the cost of the government is astronomical. the biggest mistake in modern times, in my judgment, was the passage of obamacare which seeks to turn america into a western european country. mitch mcconnell, we also have a statement from a congresswoman, democrat from connecticut. she says --

host: seniors in connecticut also save millions of dollars on the script and drugs in 2012, thanks to the closure of the doughnut hole. this will pay dividends. she goes on to say that the affordable care act was transformative for women's .ealth being a woman well no wonder be treated as a pre-existing condition. because of the law, women are finally able to access read amended cancer screenings -- recommended screenings and checkups we need to stay healthy and happy with no out-of-pocket costs. back to the phones, john innes -- in florida.

welcome to the washington journal. caller: good morning. host: your thoughts about the affordable care act. in ar: i would like to put plug for -- [indiscernible] it would set up a healthcare fund that would be consistent .ith the budget into ther would pay and get aey chose to tax deduction. you would put monies into the fund. congress would have a committee to administer the fund.

toy would issue vouchers [indiscernible] some people will not get anything at all. host: john, we're going to leave it there. senate passing their budget in the early hours of this morning. this is from the "new york times" --

s up: the vote set negotiations with the house in april to reconcile two different .ersions no republicans voted for the senate plan on saturday and for also opposedrats it. all our red state democrats up for reelection in 2014. back to the phones and our conversation regarding be third anniversary of the affordable care act. jeff in knoxville, tennessee. caller: good morning. i would like to know, what are regardinghts preventive medicine?

i am pretty holistic regarding my health, and i just want to how car companies get kickbacks if you don't have an whatent and insurance -- are your thoughts but insurance getting kickbacks for staying healthy? host: what do you think about that? caller: i think they should do it. it is an incentive to stay healthy. you save money. the company will save money for having healthier employees. i think it is a win-win on both sides. host: in the baltimore sun this morning --

host: back to the phones, wanda in michigan. the morning. -- good morning. caller: i don't understand why people have such a problem with the healthcare act. i just don't understand. if these are people who have never had insurance and had to be on public assistance, it is a terrible thing. i worked for the state of michigan for 32 years. during that time, i was laid waswhen the governor

shutting down mental institutions. i had to go on medicaid for a while. there were horrible doctors. they would do things that were not appropriate. i would have to stop them and walk out. it is a right to be able to have health care. did not have it, you would know what i'm talking about. the people in washington who are against this, they need to take their healthcare shares away. and let them go on public assistance and let them see what it is like. host: earlier, we talked about supreme coverage of the court oral argument taking place next week regarding same- sex marriage in the business section of today's new york times, some thoughts --

host: that's in today's addition of the "new york times" in their business date section. margaret in new jersey. republican line. caller: hi. i think obamacare is way out of whack. i think it is an impossible thing, i really do. host: why is that?

caller: they have all these computers, pharmacies, ierything is a big cyber -- am on medicare, but i signed up for blue cross blue shield, hoping that was going to be fine. it is so much money, it is unbelievable. i have a problem with thinking how i can't get off of it. i went to get my prescriptions, a simple and about it -- and ittic and an inhaler .ost $145 cough syrup was cheap, $10. i could go seey the doctor to get another prescription pivoted not have enough money to do it. host: has there been any relief

for you under the affordable care act? caller: no, it has been worse. i was on medicare for a couple of years because i had retired, but he was even worse. i was paying more money on medicare. -- because of obamacare. host: we will leave it there. we have this tweet who writes -- host: we've got another call from oklahoma city, oklahoma, our line for independents. this is caroline, go ahead. caller: yes. i am calling in reference to support of the affordable care act.

[indiscernible] .t is not government healthcare if she is being ripped off, is through the medicare program and pharmaceutical companies in oklahoma city. dr. ben carson, i am very disappointed in him. now, he is a republican. [indiscernible] instead of beating up on him, why don't you praise him, dr. carson? go and meet with him prime -- privately. [indiscernible] .ost: we will leave it there i want to talk with you of a bit more on what is coming up on this edition of the washington journal. next up, republicans and democrats have agreed to fund the government for the remainder of the fiscal year.

both sides have also agreed to keep the sequester in place. we will talk about the bill with ginger gibson of "politico" and later we will talk about how the ethics process works. we want to tell you what is coming up on this week's edition of newsmakers this week. on gunurn of oklahoma legislation is our guest. he will talk about this past week's budget debate and appropriation. he also talked about immigration and gun legislation. [video clip] i have spent several days, some of it on more spectrum on the arizona border. i spend a lot of time on our borders. -- those thatoday are trying to come across a legally. those that are trying to bring drugs in illegally. we are never going to solve

solve this problem until we address it in the mountain areas and some other areas the same weight we address it in the easy areas, which is a double fence with sensors, utilizing the technology that we is brokenow when it and when it comes through. we have areas in arizona right -- where the border patrol so they can come across because they keep cutting defense. it is not a big fence. .t is a barbed wire fence they mitigate so they can walk through. >> so the fence isn't working, your solution is to build another fence? >> no, you have to see this in perspective. if you look at the fence we put up, it is effective. they can't put things up against it. when it is monitored, it slows. if you look in the san diego border area, we control that.

where we have good fencing and good monitoring, we don't have much coming across. we just have not done everywhere else. hard., it is too no, we have to prioritize assets to control the border. intelligence on both sides of the border, in terms of what is going on. prongedtilizing a multi- approach. the point is, we can control our border. we have chosen not to yet. >> "washington journal" continues. here tonger gibson is talk about congress of winning a government shutdown. first, let's talk about what is happening over the last 18 hours on the senate. tell us about the passage of the senate budget and how long did it take? vote: the senate held a last night.

they voted for more than 13 hours straight on the senate floor. they00 this morning, passed a budget, the first time in four years. the rules allow them to madmen as much as they can -- amend as much as they can. they wanted to know what was wrong with going until seven or eight this morning. luckily for us, they stopped before that. for the folks that may have gone to sleep at a decent ,our and did not see coverage what might be they surprised with what happened overnight? guest: there were four democrats who voted against the budget, all four of them from conservative states that voted for rick -- mitt romney. also, trying to stop the keystone pipeline, an amendment on carbon taxes and some amendments that republicans got

done. things that dealt with climate change and other environmental issues. host: let's move on to the issue we brought you here, the house and senate this week approved legislation to keep the government funded through september, avoiding a shutdown by keeping in place the sequester. explain to us how the government funding will work under this bill. guest: the cr that was passed that heads to the president's desk, they are able to continue funding government passed march 27. it was a fine line they had to walk. republicans were not going to sign off on something but at the same time there were a number who were trying to get pieces of the sequester reinstated. as a result, he put together a , both that compromised sides working together. it leaves in place a lot of the

other cuts, air traffic control towers are still going to see problems. other places where there could be furloughs, things like me inspectors will bear the ask a little bit. host: no pun intended. what the cr stand for? guest: the continued resolution. in regular order, there is a couple oft this past years, they have not done the order. to have government funded without the regular process. without it, the government would have shut down. host: we are talking with ginger gibson. if you want to get involved in the conversation, we will show you some numbers in just a few fourds, (202) 585-3880 democrats. (202) 585-3881 for republicans.

(202) 585-3882 for independents. we will have that out throughout the segment. us byn also respond to twitter, facebook and e-mail. explain to us the difference between the continued resolution and the budget that was passed this morning. guest: it is likely to become law. the president is going to sign it. thing that is going to be in the bill is going to be law. the budget is a resolution. it is not binding. it is likely going to head to conference with the house republicans. even then, some little things, like a vote yesterday in the senate to repeal the medical device tax and obamacare, not going to happen. even though they took dozens and dozens -- none of those are

going to have any affect. on our linein ohio for democrats. go ahead, james. caller: hi, how are you doing? everybody is complaining about the government shut down and out of the situations. i want to ask the question, why isn't anybody going back to the root of the situation in regards to when we got into this with wall street, president bush when he put us into war? president obama is bringing the soldiers back, where are the funds to be utilized back into our society? all the oil we got from saddam hussein? why isn't anybody going back to the fact that the reason we got into this mess is because of what happened with the bush administration?

obama had to bail out wall street. complaining about all these other problems we are having. we're going to leave it there. you have given us a lot to work with. guest: that is a point democrats are making. deficitans were hitting spending -- but the cr is not addressing the problem. -- both sides are making that point. another element was a fight between democrats and republicans on the senate budget. how they arrived at savings in republicans said the numbers aren't realistic. host: are to be republicans also increases in spending in other areas, that it pushed the debt way beyond where it was

when they first came into office, five or six years ago? point to the trend, how much was there when obama came into office and how much there is now. when you look at what republicans are arguing about the budget, the ryan budget, the senate democrats budget, there .s a different pace of spending increased spending over time. , our linein indiana for republicans. caller: good morning. we won't really know what is in this thing until the cover is pulled out. we can't trust the media to tell us the truth. you should really -- we have politico on, you should mention if you have a conservative outfit on, you will say that they are conservative. never with politico, which is a , based onwing outfits

msnbc. 85% biased.s it is thank you and have a wonderful day. i would say just call it like it is and run down the middle. wisconsin, ours independent line. just calling about the obamacare and also about the deficit in the united states. my feeling is, many workers across america have lost their insurance and have lower wages because of company downsizing and lower profits. we still pay government workers high wages and give them excellent paid insurance. maybe it is time to decrease their wages and to make their -- make them have a

payment they have to pay for their insurance -- [indiscernible] guest: interesting point you bring up about people losing their health insurance. in a bipartisan move in this budget, there is a directive to couch the effect of the number of people losing their health insurance because of obamacare. it was a republican sponsored saying -- thing. they will try to see how much it is occurring. host: the house approved the continuing resolution by 310- 109. 27 republicans and 82 republicans voted no.

theye senate version, passed -- 20 republicans voted yes. the democrat of montana voted no. now that these two measures have been passed by the separate chambers, what happens next? guest: the cr goes to the president. sign this bill in the current form and make it law. the house passed a version, there was a deal brokered between both sides. they send it back to the house. it was very schoolhouse rock of to whatgetting back makes sense to most people following along. on our democrat line. caller: thank you and good morning to c-span. that weit is amazing

are going to have a discussion about keeping the government open. that should be a no-brainer. it blows my mind we're having this discussion. , i don't haveork a discussion about keeping the company open. waste this going to much time to keep the government open. that is absolutely amazing. thank you very much, c-span. host: ginger gibson, is this the last time we will have this discussion? guest: probably not. we have seen this trend, make or break, get something done handle things.to president obama says he wants to move away from this. a lot ofms to be agreement in congress, but we are not there yet. we have a debt ceiling.

while they passed to budgets, they still have not gone to the whole process. we could continue with these stop-measures to keep the government from shutting down until eight -- an agreement is made. , go ahead.ssee caller: i would like her to define the word "politico." americanught government for the past 19 years and we are not governed by parties. we do not covered by the constitution.

example which one is not mentioned in the constitution. if madison and hamilton thought it was important and washington thought it was important, it would have been in there. resolutions are non- binding. all it does is increase the burden of debt of my students who are now in debt probably $50,000 already. they have not graduated from high school already. households are in debt to the tune of $150,000 -- host: you have given us a lot to work with. what level do you teach? caller: high school. 12th graders? caller: yes, sir, u.s. government.

guest: host: if you go to our website, you will find information that could be helpful in helping your kids understand the operation of the u.s. government. caller: i have used it in class on numerous occasions. first, define "politico." for us who is a term are really into the weeds. host: he also talked about health care. guest: it continues to be a big debate in congress and we sell multiple attempts last night from senate republicans to pass bills that would repeal parts or all of the health care law. this is a debate still going on. we had a supreme court ruling on that. the courts ruled in their favor

that they are still making the argument is unconstitutional. host: the caller also brought up resolutions. this is a non -- non-binding resolution that was passed in the house. what is the point? guest: it still takes the temperature, a way to know where these numbers stand. the carbon tax amendment is -- or the attempt to create one, failed. republicans see it as a good that the president's climate change policy will not do well. it is writing campaign ads because they can go back to these districts and say they voted this way. host: we are talking with ginger gibson, a congressional reporter. she covered the new gingrich and mitt romney campaign. and has worked with the "

star ledger" northern new jersey. she also did some work with the montand,urnal"in which delaware and covered the governor's office and the senate race involving christine o'donnell. baltimore, maryland, go ahead. caller: i am a recently retired government worker. calmness avoids government shut down. the government has run for years of continuing resolutions. the price of things are going up.

if they cannot freeze the amount the government can spend or the amount that the consumer can spend, why cannot they control the amount that people are charged for? congress controls the purse strings. that isve got people supposed to be working, these the sequestered does not affect them but it affects normal people. lot of fact on a both sides of the aisle -- a lot of staff working hard on both sides of the aisle. this really affects them. it will probably affect some of their paychecks. why can't government keeps spending? it is politics.

they are fighting one another and putting deadlines on and setting these cliffs along the lines to -- along the way to make things happen. host: yesterday's headline -- with the passage of this continuing resolution, even

though the sequestration is still in effect, how is the money going to be distributed? who decides who goes on a furlough? guest: the sequester was across the board and cut everything indiscriminately and left them with a little bit of wiggle room. went into very specific places and restored some funding to a lower level. defense was based on the list of people that got money back. it is not surprising. defense spending can generally get bipartisan agreement the meat inspectors were looking at furloughing their employees for two weeks. it could shut down almost all meat production in the country. they have restored that and they're looking at possibly avoiding those. they will figure out if they can do it and the bill and the

numbers are complicated. host: here is a headline from one of your competitors -- back to the phones -- kingston, ill., on our line for republicans. republicanave been a for years and years. it is not my great-grandfather's republican party anymore. i am worried because i feel sorry that i am a republican but i feel sorry for the republicans. they are not doing so well and i

could not get away with the gop does at their jobs at my job. i feel sorry for them. most isorry about granted paul. i am --rand paul. and i am an old time lutheran. is not to be trusted. it is important to know exactly the religion of our candidates. there is nothing more important. host: she is gone. father is apaul's christian and religious man. the republican party is going through rebuilding and redesign and try to figure out what they will do and rand paul could be a

big part of that. he had a filibuster on the floor and i'm sure we will be hearing his name more in the future. host: mechanicsville, va., go ahead. caller: i have a question -- when you are debating about the budget, why do they continue to put amendments in there that have absolutely nothing to do with - the budget. ? guest: that the great question. it's because they can. there is a role in the senate that says they can attach strings to the budget and no one can stop them. that the opportunity senators have, they took it.

mideast policy got involved and to guns and so they did whatever they wanted to do. that was on full display. not covered in the lessons proffered by "school house rock." you talked about briefly but you can expand about how the fight in the congress over the budget on the house side and the senate side is redefining the republicans and to a certain extent of the democrats -- guest: they both put their political playbook in this. the paul ryan budget is what he ran on before and what many

republicans wanted to get behind. the medicare voucher change was something the democrats saw as red meat and it ran their budget to be anti-paul ryan. as a result, there were both out there using their fights and talking about what they thought were -- or the core principles. we saw some republicans talking about balance. winningught they were that discussion and the democrats said protect the vulnerable. from next is juanita cincinnati, ohio. i have a comment about the cr but i also want to help out the young man who called from germantown.

i was not surprised not to see the continuing resolution go through. i don't think the republicans want to be seen as the ones closing down the government. as far as the young man from germantown, i am a retired medical librarian. andcan go through the nih access the library of medicine and goes toabase the state repositories and get information that talks about the end of them 18th-century. it was on the minds of our founders. he can get that information. you have a good day and thank you. republicans don't want to

shut down the government. the republicans will tell you that shutting down the government is bad politics. they did it once before in the 1990's and it did not work well for them and they don't want to do it again. that is probably an element here. in sanext is ron antonio, texas, on our line for republicans. how can we afford to give egypt $200 billion if we cannot keep airports open? guest: they were arguing last night that the u.s. could not give any more aid particularly to egypt. determine mendez made the case against that that foreign aid plays an important role in our diplomatic ties in keeping

stability. they want to take some of the money out of foreign aid which was a late night amendment. i suspect we will continue to hear about that. host: when does the president to weigh in on this? guest: he was supposed to have sent a budget already to congress and did not. we expect to see a budget from the white house and the next couple of weeks after the deadline. that will be when he gives his own version and then we will have three versions. we saw him go on his charm offensive and start to have conversations with republicans and that is where he will play a role to broker an agreement. get a grand to bargain. that is where his role will start to come in. host: what is the purpose of his tardiness? guest: republicans will say it is because they could not force a vote on it. the white house says they are

still putting the budget together. we will see something eventually and it will be interesting. host: is it likely to look more like what was passed between the house and senate and what it might of looked like before those two chambers passed their respective bills? guest: i wish i knew. we know the president has told republicans he is willing to give on entitlements and willing to do changes to medicare and social security that was not done the democratic budget. he wants to bridge the gap. host: back to the telephones. inr next call comes from ed -- from pennsylvania. wast-boone pickens

correct that we use $300 billion per year by oil from other country and we could use $60 billion of our own, keep it here in america instead of supporting the terrorism and harry reid as the senate leader hasn't passed a budget in four years -- we treat politics like it as a sports event instead of what is our future instead of did my team win. things bother me. guest: you will hear more talk about oil especially around the keystone pipeline which remains controversial. it is something we will hear more about looking at the oil numbers. also liquefied natural gas is a big issue that republicans will push for.

the belt way thinks it is a sport. levels. on both many of look at numbers and policy. pay moreght have to for a hamburger at the meat inspectors get laid off so we look at if this is selling their point. host: regarding messaging war, what will the message be from the democrats and republicans as they go back to their districts over the next two weeks? guest: democrats will tell their constituents that they protected the vulnerable through medicare and they stop republicans from turning it into a voucher and republicans will tell their constituents that they brought down the deficit and they are trying to end the debt. that is the republican message. surely in iowa on our line

for democrats -- caller: one of the things i learned from the"financial times"was they said that we went to a single payer, we would save hundreds of billions of dollars per year and we would not be having all these fights over the budget. -- why don't we have more talk of this program about what other countries are doing? israel has single payer or something close to it. would we call them communists because they have that? i don't think so. the company that i work for in des plaines, a medical insurance company, now charges 60% overhead. can't we have some real conversations with people who know what they are talking about? guest: single payer is an issue that we have seen in this

country. probably not be a while until we see it debated again but it is an issue. you can point to other countries that use different systems and politicians make their points. host: talk to us about some stuff going on behind the scenes regarding lobbying and folks making a pitch. guest: defense is complicated. that are contractors working for the department of defense are the kind of industry that will make sure they go in and talk to those guys. a lot of industries are that way but defense as a whole is very bipartisan. nobody wants to vote against a defense.

we are seeing a new brand of libertarians like rand uaul and others say it is okay to cut defense. they are not the ones running the show. host:jim in iowa, on our line for republicans. caller: good morning and thank you. i have a question about the extended unemployment that is being funded by the federal government. were there any changes in that? guest: there were some changes under the sequester. i am not aware that they restore any of that but it could be wrong. i believe that remained intact. it looks like the levels they recommended will probably remain. host: next up is anthony from edison, new jersey, independent. caller: what is our government

doing to help us? host: is your biggest concern about the way government is being run? caller: it is like a tit-for-tat with each other. they are not working for the people. they are working for each other. about hise concerned lobbyist money. they work for lobbyists or campaign money. if they work for us, we would be in good shape in this country. they worry about what they will get. why should they care if it does not affect them? guest: that is a very cynical perspective there and maybe a right one. i don't know. about how thelk country cannot survive on debt. democrats talk about the company is never going to grow or get

bigger unless they make investments. they think government should make investment and ground the economy. host: bob from idaho on our line for democrats, good morning. caller: our garment has to change. -- our government has to change. is against our constitution. a clean systemo with a thumb print that will protect people. we need to do something with a and the states to control their own housing with better schools and better teachers, thank you. guest: the school issue has come up a lot. how to regulate and fund schools?

they are talking about block grants on medicaid which helps people. that is something still being debated as to what role the fed vs. the state plays. host: has been talk in the news recently about closing schools in chicago and detroit. is there anything in the continuing resolution that would help keep the schools open? guest: the schools are dealing with different problems and i saw the sequestered, really on militaryhools bases and in tribal lands and poor areas. they are having their own problems like chicago and detroit. it is compounded by sequester issues but there's not much for them in that legislation. host: the caller also mentioned earmarks. atst: we heard this morning

ban on.m. with a ben earmarks, they brought up a bill and then they turned it down. host: barbara on our line for republicans -- caller: what is the purpose behind sequestered because it does not help the people being sequestered. we are also tax payers. if you take 20% of your budget and cut it, these are the people paying it your taxes and the next thing you tell them is next year at tax time, you have lowered their budget, how does that make up for all the money that gets lost to the government that they need right now to fix these situations? guest: sequester was an idea of both sides thought was so bad it would never happen and then it did. it was meant to be a threat at

the end of report in process. the super committee did not happen and they never struck a deal. now a sequester is here on both sides want it for different reasons. republicans want cuts and with a can and democrats want to show how bad cuts hurt. and show that cutting government so quickly is -- has repercussions. dated from texas, go ahead. i'm not familiar with a whole lot of politics in washington. i am on social security disability. goes beyond just fixing the budget. and obamahealth care

care, as far as going beyond fixing the budget like health care. i live in a very economically depressed area. be wealthy ore to have real good insurance where you can see a dentist. that should be included with health care. you mentioned medicare and social security. these are things they will talk about in the next few months. e talk about changing the cpi or the way payments are made or the eligibility age or changing medicare as a voucher system. these are things they will talk about and it goes beyond the budget and it is part of the budget. without these changes, they

don't think they can have federal help. host: in "the baltimore sun" - guest: that's a big complaint we heard during the budget process produced -- the republican said in the first year of the democratic budget would do with very little to fix the problems. there was a proposal to switch to biennial budgeting. having a long-term plan that means something that they can change the next year takes broad consensus and structural changes. it takes the grand bargain they are talking about. from the last call is

york, on our line for democrats. caller: i work for the department of defense, and the quality assurance rep. i inspected many things that are buried vital parts for nuclear engines on submarines and ships. they want to cut government. why don't they get involved with the structures within the agency and look at how many supervisors exist and how much top management excess compared to the actual workers doing the job? they don't involve the actual agencies to see how top heavy they are and how many empires have been built and reduce unnecessary positions that can produce positions for actual workers. redundancy and waste we hear about. time and to do

that would be a big undertaking. host: we have been talking with ginger gibson from "politico." she came here straight from covering the overnight votearama in the senate. coming up next, how the congressional ethics process works and later in the program, we'll take a look of the 1986 electronic communications privacy act, law that allows investigators to gain access to e-mails older than 180 days without a search warrant. today is march 23 and you were watching "washington journal." ♪ >> the most striking difference

between what is happening today and 100 years ago is the calmne ss the parade. 100 years ago, the parade was more like a riot. the police refused to protect the marchers. as the marchers progress down the parade route, the crowds got larger and they were unruly and had been drinking and started to throw things at the women and shouted things and told them to go home. streetcars continued to anti people into the already packed crowd. the crowd got larger and larger and more aggressive. the women could not go forward. the police were not involved. the secretary of defense call about the fort myer cavalry to push back the unruly crowds so that the women could continue their peaceful exercise of their first amendment rights. today, this is a wonderful and peaceful assembly and a celebration of how far we have come in 100 years back of this

weekend, a look at the centennial celebration of the woman's suffrage parade that took place on pennsylvania avenue in march, 1913 sunday at 7:00 p.m. eastern on cspan 3. something thatn is so right, so dear, so necessary you have to get in trouble. before we got in any trouble as students and young people, we studied. we did not wake up one morning and said we're going to sit in. we did not just dream one day would come to washington to go on a freedom ride. like 1963. studied and prepared ourselves. black power and they intimidated so many people. white people used that phrase.

they use that word or that phrase, it may people think that black power meant destruction. it's meant destroying america. it was not about destroying america. it is about rebuilding america and having america to have a new paradigm in terms how we can truly be with everyone that gave that pledge when we went to elementary school about the land of the free and the home of the brave. >> congressman john lewis and olympic gold medalist and john carlos discuss their personal experiences during the civil- rights movement live from the virginia festival of the book, live tonight at 8:00 on c-span 2. >> "washington journal" continues. allison is here to

discuss congressman's ethics. tell us about the role of the house and senate ethics committees. who makes the rules? house and the senate make their own rules how the ethics committee's proceed and it is different from normal committees. both of those committees are the only two committees in congress that have an equal number of democrats and republicans. when we think about how committee's work, house and the power that a chairman as about legislation or tabling things, that is not how the ethics committee works. both the chairman and a working member are supposed to work together from both parties and they are supposed to be some collegiality and agreement on how they move forward. when somebodygins makes a complaint to the committee.

there is a format in which they have to do it. a member of the public and also make a complex but that will only act on it if a member of the house signed an affidavit saying this meets the standards of a complaint that the ethics committee should consider and it is credible. it identifies a violation of house rules that the committee can act upon. once they get the complaint, they have about five days, 5 legislative days, or 14 calendar not to decide whether or this is a legitimate complaint. once they do that, they start the long process. either they will impanel an investigative committee and it is possible for them to vote right away and whether this is something worth looking into. once they get going, they have

an investigative committee and in a judicatory committee and they decided there should be charges and whether there has been an ethics violation. it goes to the judicatory committee. it goes back to the whole committee for a vote to determine the penalties and it is a somewhat convoluted and secret process. the worst thing about it is there is almost no transparency at all for the public to have any idea of what is going on within and ethics committee investigation. in practical terms, a member can say the ethics committee is looking at this and cooperating fully with the ethics committee and if you are trying to find a more about a particular scandal, you cannot find out anything about it because they refer to the ethics committee. same does it operate the on the senate side? but the senate is a little bit more open as to how charges or

complaints can be brought. guest: there is not the same requirement that senators signed off on charges. the committee has more latitude in terms of who they investigate. it is pretty much the same process. committees are split evenly between democrats and republicans and it is a slow, closed process the public is shut out of. host: when a person makes a complaint to these ethics committee is whether they are a member of congress or someone not in congress, does it have to be a public complaint or can someone make a complaint anonymously? my understanding is that on the senate side, you can make an anonymous complaint. on the house side, the complainant must be listed. on the senate side, because there is more latitude in terms of news media accounts which can

lead to a probe, information that surfaced in state and federal investigations can start a probe -- there is not the need necessarily to wait for a complaint. the senate is more open in terms of pulling in information from outside the houses. host: we are talking with bill allison of the sunshine foundation. to get an idea of what how the ethics committee works, we'll show you a little bit of what happened during a 2010 out at 6 house ethics committee hearing with charles rangel. then the role of the committee is explained. representative charles rangel was eventually censured for financial improprieties. [video clip] >> as members of the subcommittee, we are neither

accusers or defenders of our colleague. it is our job and our duty to act impartially. we are honor bound to do so without regard to partisanship or bias. we're required to act honestly and fairly based on the evidence presented to us during the a judicatory hearing. that thisy colleagues hearing is in progress and while the process continues, we should continue to refrain from commenting on the facts, the law, or any aspect of this matter. to anshe made reference hearing.ory >that's when the investigation is finished. guest: the ad judicatory hearing is held to determine, it is the equivalent of a judicial hearing, are the guilty or not?

the investigative committee proceeds almost like a prosecutor or grand jury deciding whether or not there is a charge. when they move to be at judicatory face, they bring a new set of members. charges.ew the there is an opportunity -- a respondent, who has a chance toied as respond to these and offer their own evidence. the at judicatory committee looks at the report and make a decision has whether there has been a violation. host: we are talking with bill allison of the sunlight foundation about how congress investigates members and their

ethics. the telephone numbers are on your screen. kansasst call comes from city, kansas on our line for republicans. my name is tim. theve a question about transparency of any asestigations congress made far as general members. they brought impeachment proceedings against richard and thatr landlying amounted to not being transparent. what about obama and his failure to be transparent about anything? host: this is dealing with the

members of congress investigate other members of congress, not necessarily the impeachment of the president. caller: i'm sorry? host: we are talking about members investigating other members of congress. ok, what would be a punishment if a congressman or senator would be found guilty? what course of action do they take? guest: there is a range of things they can do. the simplest one or the least serious one is a reprimand. they will send a letter to the member saying you should not have done this. it is like getting a slap on the rest. the most serious is the out ofon, being forced

the house which requires a 2/3 vote of the house to do that. in between, you have center which is what happened to representative charles rangel when you go before the whole house and they vote on whether or not your conduct brought dishonor to the house and it is a public rebuke. the average citizen may not think it is serious but watching representative charles rangel in that proceeding, it affected him and was very painful for him. censure is a penalty and sometimes they will issue fines. the most famous example of that was in the 1990's when newt gingrich had a series of ethics charges leveled against him, i think 84 charges. the ethics committee had to bring in all kinds of tax experts and experts in a nonprofit law to unravel the political machine that newt involvedhad built that

charities and contributions were tax deductible and others that were not and they ended up levying a $300,000 fine against him which was to pay for the cost or some of the cost incurred during the investigation. they found he violated tax law. later, the irs said it was not a violation. newt gingrich was trying to use contributions1 that were tax deductible and funnel the money back into a group that could be more politically active. from: next up is don houston, texas, on our line for independents. caller: are the issues of ethics nearly financial? financial?

most of them are millionaires anyway. does it deal of personal matters or matters of breaking local laws like dwi's? personal does go into matters sometimes that there is a relationship to the house. thereamples of that -- have been at the committee inquiry is over members being or juniorith pages staff, sexual harassment-type claims, ethics investigations looking at other personal conduct. there was one ethics committee look at how the house republican leadership responded -- there was a representative from wasida, mark foley, who

sending inappropriate and and messages to congressional pages. he ended up resigning in september so there was no inquiry but they looked at whether the house properly handled the situation. they look at management skills of people but generally, if there is a local entrance like a dui or speeding ticket, the house will defer to local authorities. there is a provision in the house rules for the ethics committee that says that another body is looking into something like the fbi or something like the irs and the ethics committee is aware of it, they have the option of not opening their own inquiry. if there is something like a thel dui case, chances are ethics committee will not give into that and let local

authorities proceed. if a member is convicted of a felony, or indicted for a felony, they have to open proceedings at they choose not to go forward, they have to explain why. generally, they will defer to local law enforcement for something like a dui. salt greg is calling from lake tahoe, calif., good morning. help but thinkt that congressional ethics is a term which is an oxymoron. on the other hand, i recognize the difficulty. i watched of the charles rangel hearing come start to finish. it impressed upon the the difficulty of the matter. you had an equal number of members of each side on the panel. opendly, the hearings are but a lot of the matters are closed. in other words, the facts at

issue are not always revealed. it is hard to discern as a citizen what is actually going on. what disappointed me the most from that particular outcome was the fact that even though i am a republican, i have a great deal of respect for his service and dedication to this country. it cannot be understated. however, it appeared the nepotism of it where in one member voted i think against every single one of the resolutions despite the fact that their colleagues voted for them. it did not seem that the process worked. it did not seem there is a true ethics mechanism. it lends credence to the fact that people like myself look at this and we wonder how witty as that they can self-govern or

rather, create self-oversight. ? i would like to see some kind of changes but it seems the current system does not work. guest: i would tend to agree that the current system does not work. if there is a problem with congress over seeing itself, there is a bit of a history to this on the house side. in the 1980's, when newt gingrich was on the back bench, he used the ethics process to go after a number of members particularly then-speaker james wright of texas. -- hend he had been using had written a book or slapped together a bunch of speeches and his big campaign donors or purchasing from them. it was selling very well. it wasn't like labor unions got

10,000 copies. the book was the vehicle to get donations and he was admonish for it. when newt gingrich came in, we have the exact opposite happened. the democrats use the ethics committee process to go after new can bridge. and -- after newt gingrich. use of the house majority gephardt talking about the latest charges against house speaker newt gingrich. after that newt gingrich process came to an end and after the fine, there is a somewhat on written agreement that neither party would use the ethics committee process in quite this way. clearly, there was an awful lot

of politically motivated ethics charges. time where the ethics committee was quiet. scandalsheearmarking and others who went to jail. congress could do not do a good job of policing ethics during that period until the end of the dennis pastor to speakership. it is hard for members to police one another. as son thing called the congressional ethics. it can investigate members of congress and write reports and recommend action. what they really do is when they do those investigations and refer them to the ethics committee, you are stuck with the same process where the ethics committee decides whether to look into this. there was a big scandal around

yearsessional earmarks back that involved a lobbying firm whose leader went to jail for making illegal campaign contributions. the charges at the time were that this lobbying firm and its clients would contribute a lot of money to the campaigns of members of congress who in turn would earmark millions of dollars of contracts to these clients, put into appropriations bills and this company will get money to do such and such. the office of congressional ethics did a thorough investigation and turned it over to the house ethics committee which decided there was no scandal. i think that's what the problem of the ethics committee is. it is too timid and does not go out for members. it is a vehicle allows at this complex to kind of disappeared. host: in the wednesday edition

times."washington tell us more about why these subcommittees are being impaneled than what they're looking at? the investigative committees will start looking into the evidence that has

surfaced and both of these cases. andrews,se of rep bob the allegations are that he misused campaign funds. takeent about $30,000 to his family to scotland out of campaign funds. he later reimbursed it and there was a question as to whether that was a legitimate use of campaign funds. there are restrictions on how members can use the money that have raised for re-election. was a second allegation that he threw a party to celebrate an anniversary of his in terms of his service and the house that corresponded to the date of his daughter's graduation. funds for use of personal reasons? andrews has reimbursed his campaign committee and made the

typical statement that he is cooperating completely and he said this would exonerate him. look at this would say if i can take money out of that account but i'm not supposed to use, making restitution shows some ways -- some remorse but if you stole $30,000 from your company's pension fund, chances are, you would be in trouble. took a couple of trips many years.k to he was there back in the days of armarking where he earmarked

money for a road in florida. these are pet project to help out companies and sometimes nonprofits and schools and infrastructure in their own districts. it was a little odd to see an alaska congressman helping a florida district. there was a developer there he had a relationship with a one of that road. representative of young, the charges don't revolve around that. some of the allegations and evidence comes from the department of justice which looked into this. the department of justice has the public integrity section which looks into wrongdoing by lawmakers and looks at local state and federal lawmakers. recent years, the public integrity section has been pretty quiet. the had a high-profile case against senator ted stevens from

alaska who is charged with not filling out his financial disclosure forms properly and receiving improper gifts from a corporate executive who he had been helping. senator stevens was ultimately convicted but later, the case was overturned because it turned out the prosecutors have we -- withheld evidence from the defense that tended to corroborate his story that he thought he was legitimately paying for some of the things he was receiving. planer stevens died in a crash in alaska so the exoneration came too late. that was yet another case of the kind of droptment the ball on an ethics investigation. from the next call comes germantown, tenn., on our line for independents. caller: i'm hearing you tell us

about the republicans. i would like to know about the democrats. what about wtaers and barney frank? is this being politically taken care of? how come we're not hearing what is happening with the democrats? through annt extensive explanation of what is going on with rep andresd of new jersey and he is a democrat. aboutr: want to know waters and a woman who was getting money for her family and education that was not necessary. can you give me some details on

barney frank as well? host: anything you can tell us about representative waters case and rep franks case? guest: there was an investigation in the case of rep waters. allegations the surrounding the bank in which her husband had invested and the question was whether she used the tarp the with financial bailout to get funding for this bank. there were other questions about her staff, i believe it was her grandson who acts as her chief of staff. i cannot remember the scope of the ethics committee and what they were looking into but there were several charges involving her. they were looking at this of the

same time there were looking at representative rangel. ended the congress in 2010 with the censure of rep rankle. =gel. an ethics case can be carried over to the next congress and my suspicion is that after rep rangel and his censure. the ethics committee did not want to investigate another member. i think they have just deflated and it has fallen by the wayside. this is one of the big problems with the ethics committee is that their process is relatively opaque. i can only speculate on what is happening. from next is michael theodore, alabama. tarp belt out, there was

insider trading done when tim geithner gave the information to the did a show on it that john boehner and nancy pelosi were guilty of insider trading. to get a republican to find a democrat guilty is impossible. and to get a republican -- a democrat to find a republican guilty is impossible because they look out for each other. what can the american people do about this? wast: at the time that happening, which was 2008, when we had the emergency economic stabilization act, which set up the troubled assets relief program and a bunch of bailouts

for financial institutions, at that time, the insider trader loss, which apply to stock brokers and martha stewart and just about anybody you could think of did not apply to members of congress. this was one of the problems with the ethics process. congress set rules for themselves. there was no violation of or federal laws if members of congress were trading on insider information. something since then has been passed called the stock at -- act. thee are still problems in way it is disclosed. it should be in a searchable database. there is no reason you cannot have real time disclosures so you could see up-to-the-minute what is going on. in any case, that has been

changed. i would agree with you. if a member is trading on insider information, clearly they should suffer the same penalties any other person would, including martha stewart or any other stockbroker or anybody in the investment industry. host: we are talking with bill allison, editorial director of .he sunlight foundation we want to talk about their investigative abilities and the of legal sensitivities that factor into the investigative process. our next call comes from james in boston, massachusetts on our democrats' line.

caller: i recently saw someone on television speaking about amgen being fined $1 billion at the end of last year and an amendment being put in by 3 senators that gives them $500 million back in the next two years. i have to look at the bill that is being introduced. there is one co-sponsor. what does it mean when a bill has 1 goals -- co-sponsor? does that mean it will be swept under the rug? if there is only one co- sponsor, it means that it is not going anywhere. the senate passed a bill in the house. it is the kind of legislative

language you would not be able to understand unless you are an insider. twoaid it would delay for years the secretary of health and human services making a determination that dealt with and stage renal drugs. drug in thats a class that is approved for medicare patients on dialysis. in drug an expert studies, but there is another drug that does the same thing. if the secretary of health and human services works to open up treatment using those other drugs, there are chances amgen would take a hit. -- investors''s'

amgen talked about the fact that they would take a hit. ,his was put in by two senators orrin hatch and max baucus. this is the kind of thing that happens in congress fairly frequently. there are all these details and small bits of language and it is hard to unfurl what is going on. it is the kind of thing the ethics committee would be looking at, members of congress benefiting one company with legislation. this never ends up within the purview of the ethics committee. congress who of have been disciplined in the house of representatives. there have been 23 centers -- 10 reprimands.

bill allison, before we get back to the calls, tell us what the sunlight foundation is and what you do. is tryingt foundation to make government more transparent. we begin with a focus on congress. we have spread out and we are looking at state legislatures. we have a site that makes all state bills much more sensible and easier for the public access and follow. we have a policy department that pushes for greater transparency in congress around the country. we look at international issues around government transparency.

we have a technology division that makes one of websites that brings together a one of a host of campaign finance, lobbying, and other data in one place that makes it easier for citizens to use it. we have been reporting division that tries to apply them and let's get members of congress and other issues around the andtry, special interests other things. host: we have a tweaked -- tweet from gary. why isn't this governed by the same standards as staff employment and shouldn't be? members for house and senator -- do staff members for house and senate members fall under the same umbrella? guest: that is one of the things for the employees of the --

there is one extra penalty. an ethics committee can recommend someone be fired if they are a staff member. they are not an elected official. comes to the campaigns and nepotism, puerto rico rules of the federal election commission. it can only be paid a certain amount. pay somebody 10 times the going rate. we have seen cases of that. we get on land project -- online

memberswhere spouses of receive contributions because they were working on the reelection of the member. is the sharing of information with the department of justice? death-bang there is sharing of information. there is sharing of information. they can hire their own expert, their own counsel. they do not work that closely with justice. it is a co-equal branch of government. the house and senate make up their own rules for the conduct of members.

there is sometimes a separation of powers question. for the founders, the steer was you have a tyrannical executive using the police -- the fear was you would have a tyrannical executive using the police power against the other branches. the phone and our discussion with bill allison from the sunlight foundation. nextrom texas and our caller. caller: what are their rules of evidence for the committees? do they have any authority to investigate and discipline moral

turpitude such as drunkenness, luxury, philandering. generally speaking, there are several different phases of an investigation. time the ranking member and the chairman have agreed there is an ethical violation or something that has to be looked into, there is a time when can assemble evidence. they are only allowed to talk to ant and the member in question.

they do is where people in. it is similar to the court proceeding in that sense. we can issue subpoenas. there is a process for them do that if they have to. it is like a legal proceeding in some ways. i am not a lawyer and i am not enough of an expert on several rules of evidence to compare and contrast them. host: you talked about the charges brought against newt gingrich. witho members deal politically motivated allegations? guest: every ethics committee is a little different. what they have done since the gingrich time is that they have -- quiet.et report

that theyan agreement would not use the ethics process to settle political scores. as if john boehner is facing 84 ethics charges. that is one of the big changes. the ethics committee as a .creening process to theve the ability side of something as frivolous.

i assume there are far fewer complaints being made to the ethics committee now that were being made 16 years ago when newt gingrich was still speaker. host: our next call comes from dick in col. on our line for on ourndent -- colorado line for independents. in the case of solyndra, i would like to know if he received money. guest: i do not know. there have been other allegations were members have family members working for companies that that government contracts. i have not heard about a family

member of nancy pelosi's working at solyndra. we want to show you representative mike all conaway, , theublican of texas ranking member of the ethics committee. a democrat from california. boxer is abara democrat from california and the vice chairman is senator john isakson, a republican of georgia. bill allison has been our guest. thank you for being on the "washington journal." we will talk about the 1986 electronic communication privacy act. we will talk about efforts to update the law to provide more

privacy. we will be right back. first ladies'," rigell johnson dies of "firstarent high -- rachel johnson dies of an apparent heart attack during her husband's first term. live monday night at 9:00 eastern on c-span and c-span 3, so on c-span radio and c- span.org. >> we can take pictures of the brain and see the whole thing.

there is this enormous gap in between about how these circuits of the brain function in order to be able to move my hand or to look at you and process that information or to lay down a memory. we aim to be able to record from hundreds of thousands of brain cells at the same time to be able to understand how the services work. that is the brain activity mass that is being talked about. nothe early days, we did have a scientific plan about milestones. it is bidding to be an exciting moment to put something together and we cannot have thought of. nih director on c-span's "q & a." >> "washington journal"

continues. host: we will be talking about privacy and electronic communication with marc zwillinger. now the founder and partner of a company that provides a vice and counsel on issues that relate to internet privacy. talk to us about the basis of our discussion, the electronic communication privacy act of 1986. what was it, or what is it and what is it supposed to be doing? guest: there was a gap in what might apply to your protection for electronic communication. the electronic communication privacy act bridges that gap

regarding what the government can get about users. was a6, the internet different place than it is now. host: what are some of the significant changes that people in congress want to change? what needs to be changed and statute -- the the statue is divided .nto the users anybody gets content of loaded for storage or profit. there was not drop box or google documents of the variety of services we have now. how the statute applies, will have to decide what are you when you are an

electronic communications services provider. if you figure that out, you have to go through a complicated matrix to seagram how the statute applies. it was passed for a time when there were not so many hybrid communication services. with thething to do statute is to reform and update it. ecs and rcs stand for electronic communications services and remote communications services. senator lady has been focused on changing the requirements -- senator lady --

leahy has been- focusing on changing the requirements. when information is stored in the statute allows the government to get access to it without a search warrant. the only person who might get notices the service provider. wants to get a .earch warrant the federal law says investigators can gain access of any e-mail older than 180 days without a search warrant.

why 180 days? death-bang xliv question. when the statute -- excellent question. the idea was that people might have abandoned their interest in that e-mail. this is one way the world has changed. nearly unlimited stores in the cloud where you can keep the e- mails for years if you read it or your computer. something store for 180 days does not suggest someone has abandoned their interest in it. e-mails that are older might be much greater than the spam that comes in on a daily basis. when congress passed the electronic even cases privacy act, it created a distinction

between materials stored 480 days or more than 180 days. the west toward 180 days or more than 180 days. 180 days or more than 180 days. a federal prosecutor have to swear that they have probable cause to believe a crime has to the alleged crime has been committed and evidence of that if federal prosecutor has to swear that they have probable cause to believe that a crime has been committed and that the evidence of that crime is in the online data. the standard is whether the evidence will be relevant to an ongoing investigation. a wide variety of materials can

be subpoenaed without third- party oversight or overview. to get a search warrant, a more particular showing has to be made. host: we are talking with marc zwillinger, a former justice department computer crime attorney and the founding partner of an operation that provides council on issues related to internet practices. counsel on issues related to internet practices. if you want to get in on the conversation, 202-585-3880 for democrats, 202-585-3881 for republicans and 202-585-3882 for independents. our first call comes from frank

ourexington, tennessee on line for independents. an interesting scenario that occurred to media the day and a relates to what you are talking bout. -- talking about. this guy claimed he could take my identity if i were to go gate where he could know exactly where i was coming from. he said, if we wanted to smear you, we could attach your access pattern to a bunch of child porn and report you anonymously to federal authorities. with this sort of scenario state to your knowledge, mr.

zwillinger? thet: i cannot get into business of giving you a legal advice. couldrson threatening you be committing a crime themselves. identity theft is a federal crime. if they were to falsely attributes your ip address to activity you were falsely engage in, they could be facing some consequences. wouldn as law enforcement investigate the account, they would not find the evidence and law enforcement would be able to clear it up quickly. it may require some time and effort. host: the house judiciary committee held a hearing this week on the electronic communications privacy act. they heard from the justice department representative, who

spoke on the difficulty of updating the law for privacy process without impeding the efforts of law enforcement. [video clip] the bestave suggested way to update would be to getire law enforcement to information from a service provider. we believe this approach has considerable merit, provided congress considers contingencies for which this may pose a problem. for example, civil regulators and litigators regulate conduct that is not a crime. criminal search warrants is only available if an investigator can show probable cause that a crime has occurred. several investigators of forcing civil rights, antitrust and a host of other -- all the laws would be unable to be obtained from providers of they could no longer use a subpoena. host: explain what she was

trying to say and how this goes to the type of investigations the department of justice and other law enforcement people could do looking at your online communications. have heram please to testimony. this is the first time the department of justice has acknowledged the time is ripe for a change on the wall and standards and that the 180 day rule has no place in the model statute. when she was explaining was if you require a search warrant for all content online, civil agencies of the government do not have the power to get a search warrant. search warrants are given when there is probable cause that a crime has been committed. for several crimes, they are not able to do that. the statute to its people equally right now on the civil side. -- treats people equally right now on the civil side. in a divorce case or a custody

battle or a sudden fall lawsuit, a plaintiff cannot subpoena yahoo and google and say, i want the cantons of the other side's e-mail. they have to -- i want the contents of the other side's e- mail. they have to get it directly from the other side. she is looking for an exception that would give the department of justice an advantage in civil cases where they could send a subpoena or something like it to google or yahoo and turn over the contents of e-mail. that is a dangerous place to go. when you start creating exceptions in the statute for civil discovery, why should the government have the advantage over a civil lawsuit? host: back to you our discussion regarding privacy and online communication. our next call comes from missouri on our line for democrats.

go ahead. caller: thank you so much for c- span. i would like to ask the guess what his background is and if i am not mistaken, the congress elected committee to investigate themselves. is that right to? i will hang up and listen to your comments. thank you very much. you under the impression that we are still talking about congressional ethics? let's move on to eric in nebraska on our line for independents. caller: you have talked about storage online and end of the cloud. the clouds. if a person has an e-mail address and you delete the e- mail from your trash folder, is that e-mail still recoverable by authorities of the were looking for it?

without getting into specifics, when you delete things from your e-mail if you are not under surveillance at the time, those documents typically disappear within a matter of days. a search warrant served on your account 30 days from now would not be likely to pick up the mail you have chosen to delete. host: our next call comes from on our live cajon for democrats. good morning, edward. if you are not committing a crime, why do you care if the government is reading your e-mails or not? guest: thank you for that question. i have heard this question before. why should you care about government surveillance? the answer is you might be doing lots of things that are private

to you if you do not want the government follow up on our inquiring on. we learn something about the petraeus scandal. people who had e-mails send to and from the parties involved were questions about the contents of those e-mails even though a lot of those e-mails were not about committing a crime. there are private things you might do online that he would not one shared with the government or the public. during anhat point investigation by the government to they have to make you aware of the fact they are looking into your e-mails or your online communications? guest: it depends on the type of process the government is using. if they are using a search warrant, they do not need to make you aware. they need to make the search -- the service provider aware. if they are trying to use one of the lesser processes available under the statute now, which would be a subpoena or a court

order, they should come with prior notice to the subscriber. there is a provision that allows the government to delay notice up to 90 days of they believe no defined the subscriber would have an adverse affect. from my experience, the government routinely uses those provisions in criminal investigations to delay know this because of the fear that the fine piece of scarborough would result in deletions or flights. -- feared that those pieces of evidence would result in deletion or some kind of flight. host: as the law stands right now, the search provided is under no obligation. if the government comes to the service provider and says, we need some information regarding lost e-mails, the service provider is under no obligation to call up rob and say, while we are giving this in relation to

the government, you should be aware that the government is looking into your e-mails. >guest: that is correct. some providers have a user notice policy. if someone wanted to get access to anything related to your account in a divorce, they could. providers would not be able to provide notice of anything that is under seal. only some providers give notice to their users. it is a growing trend. our conversation regarding online privacy of communication with marc zwillinger. our caller is on our lives for independents. -- caller: my question is regarding hippa. --

i complained in an area of elder abuse. i submitted some legislation i was asked to draft as a material the diverse as the need for that legislation. in particular, i submitted a days of evidence from my own experience where my dad was taken advantage of on the day he died of cancer on a morphine to of. the material was redacted -- died of cancer on a morphine drip. the identity of those individuals are not deleted. what is deleted is axel references to what took place. to what tookss

place. if authorities are going to read that material like this and the only recourse you have this to go to court, which most of us cannot afford, it seems like we have very little protection against abuses. who is going to stand up for those of us who are being exploited when we are advocating for laws to protect the vulnerable, such as alzheimer's sufferers and those considered to be mentor reporters, but not be held accountable -- considered to be mandatory reporters but not held accountable to mandatory reporting laws. for your loss.ry this is outside of my area of expertise as to whether or not inappropriate reactions were made with regard to --

redactions were made with regard a. hippa are going to move on to gary in texas on our line for democrats. good morning. caller: i have a question about third-party inquiries. i have a family member who works in the insurance industry. she told me a while back that in the case of a car accident, for example, the first thing the insurance company does is to check to see if the party was using their cell phone at the time of the accident. what rules are in place to regulate that type of investigation? guest: that is a great question. it does concern the communications privacy act, but a different portion. if the insurance company wants to get records from your cellphone provider, the cell

phone provider cannot give out information about your use of the phone without legal process. that process would not be the same as for content online. dial and numbers you when you dialed them are not .rotected there would be the requirement of a legal process being served on your provider. since this is not a criminal investigation the way you would describe it, you would give notice from your provider that your records were being subpoenaed. a subpoena would have to be given to the cell phone company for your records. likely, you would find out about that. host: next up is charles in french lick, indiana. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. in the old days of the internet structure, in the 1980's and

early 1990's, it is my understanding that the internet comes through the united states, all of the traffic is through our country. they always bring up privacy issues. these things or talked about in the last 10 of 15 years and bills have been passed. my question is, why would we want to tax the internet and are going to tax the internet when we have had full control of the internet all of this time? every keystroke, everything that anybody who does in this country is recorded. of nationaler defense policy of president -- it would have been clinton. it was an executive order, if

you look it up. i just looked at the extra taxes and the things being added on now. it is really threatening to the american public to hear all of this. this is a medium we have all learned how to use. we have all enjoyed it. host: we will leave it there, charles. is this a case of the law trying to catch up with the events -- advancements in technology? guest: i think it is. our understanding of how the law should apply to whatever we do online has changed as well. in 1986, we were not storing our most private documents in the cloud. you are not using texting medications as a substitute for making phone calls. now we do. we expect that we communicate

with someone through e-mail, there is a certain level of privacy attached to those communications. be a little bit ahead of congress. the court -- caller may be a little bit ahead of congress. the court of appeals set individuals that a reasonable expectation of privacy when they used an e-mail to communicate. that expectation does not go away when the e-mail reaches a certain age. we have one court in the country that has already found that the portions the deal with stored communication over 180 days old are likely unconstitutional. we need to catch up with technology. congress needs to catch up with what the courts are already. host: they are saying that we, the public, should expect a certain amount of privacy up to 180 days?

guest: the court is saying our expectation would be regardless of what has 80 days we will have an expectation of privacy in our e-mail. host: what if we wrote something down on a piece of paper and they got lost in a trash bag or underneath a pile of dirty socks. aest: what if you put it in place of honor in your house and 180 days had passed? your expectation of privacy should not matter based on the age of the communication. they are pretty much the same. the court is starting to recognize that. host: we are talking about electronic communications with marc zwillinger. he is a founding partner a foundingll -- partner with zwillgen.

caller: thank you for taking my call. i wanted to know if your caller is familiar with the program that uses key words to search all electronic communications. guest: i am familiar with what i've heard. my understanding is that it involved communications outside the united states. i am not involved with the details of it in any way. it is not something my clients ask for advice and counsel on. this a government law enforcement type program? guest: it is surveillance and national security issues. about senatored leahy and his work on the revision of the electronic communication privacy act. what about on the house side? who is walking on and -- working on it?

be t: it would representative lofgren. 1986, our phones were not providing g.p.s. information. it is a question under the statute how location data is being protected. can the government obtained with a court order or does the government need a search warrants? perspective informational where you are going to be in the future. the best prospect of spective on -- prope information on where you are going to be in the future. host: if i have one of those online calendar functions and i have written in next week i will

be here, this would protect me from the government coming in and saying, you will be here next week. if we want to rest him, that is where we should be. guest: the calendar entry would be protected by the store's contents provision. contente stored provision. i wear a g.p.s. watch. of blows to the signals and that is posted online i can see where i have been in a given day. let's say the government wants to capture location from my watch. that seems like a pretty interesting bits of information to track my precise whereabouts. right now, the government is trying to get access of that information through a combination of processes that are not as robust as a search warrant. it would be a court order. would say, thell

government needs to get a search warrant. host: our next call from mario is from connecticut. caller: good morning. my question is, with the communications assistance for law-enforcement agencies act and to parameters they use --gnose, to serve veil -- surveil, would what you are talking about type into the coin cases assistance for law enforcement act? guest: he is talking about the law that provides additional

providers of wireless and broadband providers to have surveillance capabilities built into their network. so that when the government obtains a court order and says i want to intercepted communications of a particular user our caller, they can do it. traditional phone communications, cell phones and wire lines. it applies to broadband internet. it does not apply to everybody that has an application that is available in the apple itunes store. if you have leave guilty to communicate online d e-mail, text messaging -- if you have the ability to communicate online through e-mail and text messaging, there is no back door built in for government surveillance. that is a separate subject that you may want to take up the some point, which is if there is a good idea to expand that. i think it would be a terrible

idea. the way the color's question relays, there would have to be surveillance -- cholera -- relates, thereon would have to be surveillance. host: facebook and twitter, are they open to scrutiny from these laws? guest: it is not quite clear how to apply this acts to facebook and twitter messages. the direct private messages are a lot like e-mail. e-mail provision should apply. what happens if you send a poke on facebook that 15 of your friends can see? is that a communication that you have a reasonable expectation of privacy for? what happens when you posted on facebook. what happens when you have --

post iit on facebook or when you have -- post it on facebook or when you have 100 friends. host: back to the phones. karen in florida on our line for republicans. you are on with marc zwillinger. go ahead. my question relates to getting a receipt of services for services that were not done. when you sent to the u.s. mail, that is called fraud. when you private message or text message somebody, will that where it same weight protects the consumer for receipt of services not done. if it is done to the u.s. mail, it is protected. ?s that applicable to this law guest: i think it is not.

this law is concerned if that receipt is stored online through your gmail account and the government or a third party was to get access to it without your knowledge. the validity of the receipt or whether or not it is resource of all is not -- enforceable is not part of the act. tweet that says, if you want privacy, not upload your whereabouts to garmin. -- is itt simple gemma that simple? garmin -- let's say garmin is the recipient of one of these orders. what can they do? those are the questions i deal with every day in representing wireless providers, cable providers, and e-mail providers online.

your expectation of privacy does not depend on whether you share that information with a third party. we cannot do the things we do in society like text or e-mail or track our whereabouts in any way without involving a third party somehow. we cannot do it by ourselves. host: back to the phones. schenectady, new york is on the line. i think you are the best post. i am not sucking up in any way. what is the burden of proof that people will say or use to look at your e-mail? i am in my forties and i do not use a cell phone much. what is the burden of proof to

just go digging through your e- mail? guest: that is exactly why we are here talking. right now, the government is trying to get access to your e- mail with less than probable cause. be evidence that a crime has been committed and that the evidence is in your e- mail account. we need reform. the statute itself would allow the government to use a lesser talents than a search warrant to get access to your e-mail. host: thank you very much. marc zwillinger is making these -- this conversation interesting. he has run privacy and security groups with two national law firms and has a b.a from tufts university and a j.d. from harvard.

caller: some companies will keep them for days, weeks, or years, mean that the for their purposes. or they covered separately can the government request that the data? host: we are going to leave it there. marc zwillinger? commenthe caller's about backups is interesting. the provider has your interesting -- your information and if they back that up, it is still covered by the same statute. host: is there any way possible

or inning to expectation of privacy in communications you with you delete it or go into your cookies? is there truly an expectation of privacy online? guest: it depends on how you conduct yourself online. toyou are sending e-mails people, you can reasonably expect privacy for that. if you are sending communication to a system that you have agreed that the communications will be monitored and other people might have access to them and you send them to five and to people at a time or you send them to facebook, you might not have that expectation. host: we are talking with marc zwillinger, a computer crime section attorney. he has been talking to us about

privacy an online communication. we want to thank you for being on this edition of "washington journal." we want to let our viewers and listeners know about what is coming up tomorrow on "washington journal." we will have the washington bureau chief of the jewish daily forward. is with-- arikat will talk about peace in the middle east. we will also have bill plante. he will be here to discuss one of years of presidential press conferences and held press conferences are used by the president and the press. we will finish up by talking about concerns over north korean's recent nuclear weapons

tests and the u.s. missile defense capability. we want to thank everybody who has been involved in the "washington journal." we will see you tomorrow morning at 7:00 a.m. eastern time. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013] >> today on c-span, immigration and customs enforcement director testifies on releasing illegal detainees and detention centers. followed by fbi director robert

mueller and his 2014 budget. later, a look at hurricane sandy recovery efforts. next, immigration and customs enforcement. a testimony from the house judiciary committee on the release of detainees and their release from centers as a response to sequester. this is just under three hours. >> >> the judiciary committee will come to order and the chair has declare recesses of the committee at any time. opportunityke the

to make members aware of our new policy regarding participation in sub committee hearings. i was asked if members who are not a member of the sub committee if they are allowed participate in sub committee hearings. after giving it some thought i came up with some resolution without over burding the sub committees. those who are a member of the full committee may attend and that member can ask questions ifthe witnesses but only

yielded time by an actual member of the sub committee. i would ask member who is intend to participate let the staff know so we may prepare accordingly and it will remain the policy that we don't allow members who participate who are not members of the judiciary committee. we welcome everyone here on the hearing of the criminal detainees. i will recognize myself for an opening statement. on march 1, the sequestration deadline required that certain federal agencies and departments to reduce their budget to avoid violating mandated spending caps established under the budget control act of 2011. the office of management and budget told them to "reduce risks and minimize impacts on the agencies core mission in service of tme